“There was also evidently great division of opinion among Her Majesty’s Ministers upon this subject. The Vice-President of the Board of Trade, in the House of Lords, when introducing this Bill, expressed a decided opinion adverse to the principle of Patents altogether. The noble Secretary for the Colonies (Earl Grey) agreed with the Vice-President of the Board of Trade, and now it was found that the advisers of the Crown had put an end altogether to Patents in the colonies. Was it right, then, to continue a system in England which had been condemned in principle by the advisers of the Crown? And were they to legislate upon a question which the divisions in Her Majesty’s Council rendered still more doubtful?” Mr. Cardwell, sensibly and patriotically, “Would remind the House of the case of the sugar-refiners of Liverpool, who complained of this part of the Bill.” I need not quote Mr. Ricardo, whose lamented death prevented him from urging the present subject as he intended. Allow only the following observations of Mr. Roche, who on the same occasion— “Entirely agreed that the Patent-Laws should be abolished altogether. They might depend on it that nine-tenths of the Patent inventions, under any law that could be passed, would be nothing less than so many stumbling-blocks in the way of improvement.” Here is an extract from the proceedings of the British Association at Glasgow:— “Mr. Archibald Smith was convinced that a majority of scientific men and the public were in favour of a repeal of the Patent-Law, and he believed its days were numbered. He held it was the interest of the public, and not the patentees, that should be consulted in the matter. This was a growing opinion amongst lawyers and young men of his acquaintance.” I revert to the injurious influence of Patents in incapacitating manufacturers to compete with their foreign rivals, and am able to submit Continental testimony that such is the inevitable effect. The following lengthy quotation will suffice from M. Legrand, Auditor of the Council of State of France:— “There is in this institution not only an obstacle to the development of home trade, but also a shackle on foreign commerce. “The doors which we open by our Treaties of Commerce may by means of Patents be closed. “Let an invention be freely worked in Belgium; if in France it be patented, Belgian produce cannot enter there. Let the contrary be the case; we cannot export to Belgium the production which is free with us, but patented at Brussels.